Table of Contents:
Teaching Philosophy
Teaching Experience
     Responsibilities
     Courses taught
     Other relevant experience
     Teaching methods and strategies
     Teaching interests
Measures of Teaching Effectiveness
     Selected Responses from Student Evaluations
     Selected Student Comments
Efforts to Enhance Teaching
Future Teaching Goals
Appendices

    As a teacher, I feel that my main roles are to serve as a guide and a mentor for the students and to facilitate learning.  As a result of my experiences teaching introductory courses in physical geography and upper-level courses in climatology to classes of between 8 and 150 students, I have found that I can reach my students most effectively by developing rapport and by showing enthusiasm for the course material.  To be an effective guide and mentor for the students requires developing good rapport.  I work to build rapport with my students by encouraging them to meet with me outside of class to ask questions and discuss course material, and by taking a personal interest in their lives.  As I get to know the students, I am able to personalize the course by using examples and illustrations that they can relate to.  My enthusiasm for teaching physical geography/climatology is consistently recognized in my course evaluations.  I have found that when I am excited about the material being covered in class, this excitement rubs off on the students and helps to facilitate the learning process.

I have two main teaching objectives.  My primary objective is to provide students with a solid understanding of climatology and physical geography (e.g. how the physical world works, the importance of human-environment interactions, etc.).  As a teacher it is my job to facilitate student learning by taking complex issues and ideas and presenting them in an understandable manner.  Students process information most effectively when they are actively involved in analyzing and processing it, rather than just passively soaking it up.  Therefore, I also facilitate student learning by offering classes that involve analyzing, criticizing, evaluating, discussing, and formulating.  I have found that if you tell students something (lecture) they will forget, if you show them (demonstration) they might remember, but if you get them involved (lab, exercise, or activity) they are most likely to remember and understand.  Therefore, in addition to presenting material through a traditional lecture format, my classes also incorporate other activities such as discussions, in-class exercises, demonstrations, hands-on activities, and case studies.  When I first started teaching, my classes primarily involved lecturing.  I have since realized that when students are more actively involved in the learning process, they gain a better understanding of the material and they have more fun.  This is one area of my teaching that I am continuing to develop.  Since not all of the students have the same preferred learning style another way that I facilitate student learning is by catering to different learning styles (e.g. aural, visual, read/write, kinesthetic).  For example, I make extensive use of technology when I teach.  My lectures are presented using PowerPoint because I have found that this an excellent way to augment the presentation of a topic with visual material such as pictures, diagrams, and animations.  In addition, my courses have a companion web site where students can access additional information about the lecture material, review the course notes, download assignments, and explore related sites on the Internet.  I also have incorporated videos and movie clips into my courses.  Varying the methods by which the material is presented allows me to appeal to a range of learning styles.

My secondary objective is to help students develop important skills that they can utilize no matter what career they choose.  In particular, I think that it is important for students to learn how to learn, learn how to think for themselves, and develop effective written and verbal communication skills.  My role is to model these skills for the students by demonstrating how I think critically, generate and test hypotheses, and evaluate the research of others.  I like to structure my courses so that as the semester progresses students are required to complete assignments that are increasingly challenging.  For example, to develop verbal communication skills I will start by having students answer questions in class and participate in discussions, then they will give a brief presentation to the class, and finally at the end of the semester they may be required to participate in a debate or give a final project presentation.  This allows me to guide their development by providing appropriate activities that will help them improve their communication skills.  The constructive feedback that I provide after each assignment helps them to build on their strengths and improve on their weaknesses.

I find teaching to be both an incredibly challenging and rewarding endeavor.  It is challenging because each student is unique, having different backgrounds, expectations, skills, learning styles, and differing levels of prior knowledge.  As a result, I must be flexible in my approach to teaching so that I can meet the unique learning needs of each student and make the material interesting and relevant to their lives.  Teaching is also very rewarding because if I have done my job well, my students will have acquired valuable knowledge, learned important life-skills, and gained a greater sense of curiosity about the world around them.
 

Courses Taught:

• GEOG203 Planet Earth: Introduction to Earth System Science
• Spring 2006, Fall 2006, Spring 2007, Fall 2007
• GEOG203 (Honors) Planet Earth: Introduction to Earth System Science 
• Spring 2006
• GEOG324 Global Climatic Regions
• Fall 2005, Fall 2006, Fall 2007
• GEOG434 Hydrology and Environment
• Spring 2007
• GEOG 485 Directed Studies
• Summer 2006, Spring 2007
• GEOG 685 Directed Studies
• Fall 2006, Spring 2007, Summer 2007
  

University of Delaware

• 005.101 Introduction to Physical Geography: Climatic Processes
• Summer 2002, Winter 2004
• 005.111 Physical Geography: Climatic Processes Lab
• Fall 2002
  

University of Manitoba

• 053.373 Geographic Information Systems
• Summer 2001
  

As a professor and instructor I have been responsible for all teaching and administrative duties associated with delivering these courses.  These duties included designing the course syllabus, selecting the textbook, creating and delivering lectures, administering and grading tests and assignments, holding office hours, and determining final grades.  Please refer to Appendices A, B, and C for examples of course syllabi, lecture notes, and class assignments. 

Other Relevant Experience:

• Higher Education Teaching Certification, Center for Teaching Effectiveness, University of Delaware Completed: Fall 2004
• Faculty Advisory Board, Center for Teaching Effectiveness, University of Delaware, 2004–2005
• Quiring, S. M. and J. Kitchen (2004) Surviving the first year of graduate school.  Workshop presented at the Colonial Academic Alliance Undergraduate Research Conference, University of Delaware, February 2004.
• Quiring, S. M. and M. Leighey (2003) Making the most of your office hours: What works for you and your students.  Workshop presented at the Annual Conference for Graduate Teaching Assistants, University of Delaware, August 2003.
• Shipman, H., Mormul, M., and S. M. Quiring (2003) Being part of an instructional team: Working with your faculty mentor.  Workshop presented at the Annual Conference for Graduate Teaching Assistants, University of Delaware, August 2003.
• Guest lecturer, Conservation of Natural Resources (GEOG235), Department of Geography, University of Delaware, Fall 2004.
• Guest lecturer, Water and Society (GEOG320), Department of Geography, University of Delaware, Spring 2004.
• Guest lecturer, Introduction to Physical Geography (GEOG101), Department of Geography, University of Delaware, Summer 2003.
• Guest lecturer, Introduction to Physical Geography (GEOG129), Department of Geography, University of Manitoba, Fall 2000.
  

Teaching Methods and Strategies:
I make use of many different teaching strategies in my courses.  Five of these strategies are described in more detail below.

1) Varying presentation style
Varying the methods by which the material is presented allows me to appeal to a range of learning styles.  My lectures are primarily presented using PowerPoint because I have found that this an excellent way to incorporate visual material such as pictures, diagrams, and animations.  I also like to incorporate videos and movie clips into my courses and use demonstrations to communicate new concepts to the students.

2) In-class exercises
I routinely use in-class exercises to help the students to learn, understand, and apply the material covered in the readings and lectures.  I require the students to complete these exercises in small groups (3-4 students) to encourage them to work with each other and learn from each other.  The group responses are graded and the answers are discussed at the beginning of the next class. 

3) Course web site
I create a web site for all of my courses where students can access additional information about the lecture material, review the course notes, download assignments, and explore related sites on the Internet. 

4) Making connections between course content and the real world
I believe that its’ important for an instructor to help students make connections to the real world because “seeing these connections” can motivate the students to learn the more theoretical material.  I want students to be able to answer questions such as: Why are we studying this?  What is the purpose of this course?  Am I ever going to use what is covered in this course?  Making connections is particularly important in introductory courses because they are taught to a diverse group of students from a variety of disciplines.  One of the ways I like to develop connections between the course and the real world is to use current events as teaching tools (as the subject of in-class exercises, to explain a concept, etc.).

5) Regular assessment and feedback
I employ short, so-called “one-minute papers” as a means to assess how well the students understood the material that was presented.  The minute paper is an activity that can be used at any point during a lecture.  Students are given two or three minutes to write a few sentences on a piece of paper or cue card that summarize the important concepts that have been covered in the lecture.  An alternative approach is to have the students write down what they did not understand from the lecture (what was unclear, also known as the muddiest point).  I collect these cards from the students and use them to clarify what the students didn’t understand at the beginning of the next class.

Teaching Interests:
I teach undergraduate and graduate courses in climatology, hydroclimatology and physical geography.  I can also teach selected quantitative methods and technique courses.  A selected list of course titles is included below.

Climatology, Hydrology, Physical Geography:
                                            Introduction to Physical Geography/Earth Systems Science
                                            Weather and Climate
                                            Hydroclimatology
                                            Physical Climatology
                                            Applied Climatology
                                            Micro/Synoptic Climatology
                                            Hydrology/Hydrological Modeling

Methods and Techniques:
                                            Quantitative (Statistical) Methods
                                            Spatial Data Analysis
                                            Computational Methods in Environmental Research

Selected Responses from End-of-Term Quantitative Student Evaluations

(A complete package of student evaluations for each course is available upon request)  

Selected Student Comments End-of-Term Qualitative Student Evaluations
(A complete package of student comments is available upon request)

Student comments are organized around three themes: instructor enthusiasm and proficiency, student/instructor interactions, and classroom atmosphere.  The following comments are a selected sample of student comments.

Instructor Enthusiasm and Proficiency:

“You are very knowledgeable about the information. Your presentation of the material makes it more understandable than other professors I have had.”

“Good job! It was interesting and fun! You were very enthusiastic!”

"The course has certainly increased my interest in the news"

“You’re very knowledgeable and were able to present a lot of information.”

“I can better understand the complexity of the weather and climatic systems since they are a daily event.  It was really interesting.”

“I really enjoyed the material in this course.  I had not had a science class for several years so I enjoyed learning different material and having to think a different way than usual.  I also really liked the professor.  The first day I came to class there were doughnuts and coffee and to me that just showed he cared about his students and wanted them to enjoy class as well as the material.”

“Mr. Quiring is enthusiastic, well organized, and very accessible to his students.”

“Enthusiasm for the class is evident; seems comfortable in front of the class and is very knowledgeable and well organized.”

Student/Instructor Interactions:

"I didn't think that I would enjoy your class but it turned out to be an enjoyable class and I got a lot out of it... I would definitely recommend this class to others."

"I really enjoyed your class and I really can't say thank you enough for helping me through [my problems this semester]"

"While I found your class to be very challenging this semester, I really enjoyed it and learned a lot."

“Thanks for all your help this semester.”

“Thank-you for having a good teacher/student relationship and being accessible to answer any questions we might have had.”

“He is a good teacher and a nice guy.  He really cared if his students had any problems or not.  He really wanted us to learn this stuff.”

“Instructor was very open to questions and answered them according to student’s learning style.”

“I appreciated your approach to this course.  You obviously know the material and are enthusiastic about teaching it.  I also appreciated your accessibility, you were easy to approach and your responses to questions either in person or via e-mail were always graciously given and pertinent.”

Classroom atmosphere:

“You are so funny!”

The thing I enjoyed most about this course was:
    “I learned about climatology.”

    “the new and interesting information I learned.”

    “the in-class exercises and take-home exercises.”

    “the in-class group work helped me understand and apply the lectures.”

    “the use of PowerPoint – this makes it very easy on students to comprehend the lecture material.”

    “(the instructor) thoroughly explained all aspects of the course material.  He added to the PowerPoint presentation with numerous diagrams and animations.”

I believe that being a good teacher involves more than just knowing a lot about your subject area.  Teaching is a skill that can be improved with guidance and practice.  I have devoted significant time and effort to improving my teaching abilities.  For example, I have enhanced my teaching by participating in the Higher Education Teaching Certification program offered by the Center for Teaching Effectiveness at the University of Delaware.  This program offers a number of courses in topics like Pedagogy, Learning in the University Classroom, and Faculty Roles.  My participation in this program has forced me to critically examine how I teach and to evaluate my strengths and weaknesses as a teacher.  This self-examination has helped me to highlight those areas that I need to continue to develop.  In addition, through this program I have become familiar with 'best practices in teaching' and been introduced to the literature on teaching and higher education in my discipline.

I have recently co-authored a paper that focuses on pedagogy:
Levia, D. F. and S. M. Quiring (in press) An Analytical Rubric for Assessment of Student Learning in a Hybrid PBL Capstone Seminar: A Template for Other Courses in Geography Curricula. Journal of Geography in Higher Education.

I have a number of additional papers in preparation that focus on the scholarship of teaching geography in higher education.

Over the next few years I plan to improve my teaching by focusing on the following goals:
1) Continue to implement active learning strategies within my classroom.
I have been making a conscious effort to supplement the lecture material in my classes by providing other activities such as discussions, in-class exercises, demonstrations, hands-on activities, and case studies.  These activities were valuable because they increased student interest in the course and they helped the students connect with and learn the material.  On the end-of-term evaluations many of the students commented that they would have enjoyed (even) more in-class exercises and activities.

2) Developing  new labs for GEOG 203 and GEOG 324
Over the next year I am planning on developing new labs for the undergraduate classes that I teach at Texas A&M.  These labs will involve collecting, analyzing, and visualizing (using Google Earth) climate data.

3) Developing more learner-centered syllabi
In the learner-centered syllabus I focus on what I want the students to be able to do (and know) as a result of taking a particular course.  Once I have clearly defined measurable learning objectives and established grading criteria and standards of performance, I can then use these learning objectives to define the course content and select appropriate course assignments.  A learner-centered syllabus helps ensure that the students clearly know what they are expected to learn (both in terms of content and skills) and it helps me to make sure that they successfully reach these goals.
 

Appendix A: Course Syllabi
    GEOG 203: Planet Earth: Introduction to Earth System Science
    GEOG 324: Global Climatic Regions

Appendix B: Lecture Notes, Examples of Assignments and Exercises
    All course-related materials and information are available through WebCT Vista or by request.

Appendix C: Strategies for increasing active learning in large introductory Physical Geography classes
    Paper prepared as part of Higher Education Teaching Certification Program